


in for repairs

by goldkirk



Series: Shutterbug [6]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Autistic Damian Wayne, Damian Wayne Needs a Hug, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Good Brother Tim Drake, Jewish Bruce Wayne, Jewish Tim Drake, Tim and Bruce as eternal coffee bros, Trauma, and damian needs as many big brothers as he can get, and there needs to be more tim and damian as bros content in the world, animal death (mentioned), canon? what canon. my canon now. comics are a choose your own adventure anyway, gratuitous love of Tikkun Olam, listen it was so hard to write this but by golly i did it anyway, no lamps were actually harmed in the making of this fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 19:49:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,959
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23602621
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldkirk/pseuds/goldkirk
Summary: Damian snoops on Netflix and watches something he really shouldn't have, and has a meltdown. When Bruce has averted the crisis, it's Tim who steps in to have a talk, and to both Tim and Damian's surprise, it goes better--and more honestly--than they could expect. Gratuitous dog cuddles sure help, too.
Relationships: Tim Drake & Damian Wayne
Series: Shutterbug [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1575793
Comments: 60
Kudos: 814





	in for repairs

**Author's Note:**

> HELLO IT IS I, I COULDN'T STAY AWAY FOR EVEN A WEEK. Please enjoy this humble contribution to the sad lack of Tim and Damian brotherly content in this world, I hope I wrote them okay!!!

They should have checked Netflix. They _ should have checked Netflix.  _

To be fair, Bruce had made it extremely clear to Damian that if he wanted to watch any non-kid-approved content, he needed to ask permission before using Bruce’s profile to do so. And Damian had, miraculously, stuck to that rule, albeit with grumbling. But they should have knowing it wouldn’t last forever; Damian had had no semblance of a normal childhood and most of the “family-friendly” content was either uncomfortable, confusing, or flat-out boring for him. He seemed to be developing a soft spot for Dreamworks films, thanks to Dick, but for the most part Damian preferred to watch documentaries. 

Tim should have known he’d run out of those on his kid profile. That he’d start poking around. Bruce should have realized. But they’d been busy, and there’d been two Arkham breakouts in as many weeks, and the school year had just started up again, and--

Well. They just hadn’t thought about it lately. They’d gotten complacent. 

And unfortunately, Damian went looking on Tim’s profile. As far as Tim can tell, Damian stuck to some war documentaries and a few other niche topics that Tim had already watched in the past, which is why he didn’t notice any unusual activity on his profile. 

But while the rest of the family was puttering around doing their usual Saturday morning routines--mostly consisting of sleeping in, digging out cereal, watching Vine compilations on sofas, etc.--Damian was in the media room. While Tim was yawning wide enough to crack his jaw and reaching out to accept his mug of coffee from Bruce, whose hair was still an uncombed mess, Damian was minutes into a documentary they’d all forgotten was on Netflix. The one about the people on the internet who hunted down a murderer. The one with the animal cruelty. The one where kittens die.

Tim and Bruce are sprinting from the kitchen a second after they hear the first scream and sound of something breaking from way down the hall. Their coffees, barely touched, sit abandoned on the island in their wake. 

* * *

Bruce has to restrain Damian for several minutes while his youngest screams and fights him with everything he has, and Tim stands just outside the doorway watching with ice in his chest, his whole body feeling like a guitar tuned an octave too tight. 

He’s down to maybe four-ish times a year. On the really bad days. He’s not counting the Scarecrow nights, those are just--those are different. The rest of the time, he just needs contact or space, not actual restraint. He knows Jason still needs to be restrained every great now and then, but Tim’s never seen it. Jason lets Tim see him in bad moods now, lets Tim see when he needs to cry or be upset, but he’s still never let Tim be around for a real episode. 

Tim feels like he’s watching a train crash, sort of. He knows he’s been here, done this. He knows it always ends, and that Bruce is stronger than all of them, even Jason, and knows what he’s doing. But he can see how upset both Damian and Bruce are, and how much it’s taking out of both of them. And he knows exactly how exhausted Damian’s going to be when he’s calmed down. 

And that Damian isn’t going to be able to stand being around Bruce for hours. Not after losing control in front of the person he respects most in the world. As much as Damian’s improved since coming to live with them, he still sees Bruce as the person he has to impress. He’ll go to Bruce to show off accomplishments, but not when he’s frustrated or hurt. Bruce has to hunt him down, if he notices the signs in time. It’s his brothers that Damian will actually seek out, sometimes, and by brothers Tim means Dick. But Dick is working today until three. Jason’s at school. Cass is over at Steph’s, and Tim is rapidly coming to the conclusion that apparently, he’s it. 

Well. 

If he’s going to have to be the big brother this time, he’d better be ready. Tim listens for a moment to Bruce’s constant stream of words, calm and quiet, to Damian’s harsh breathing and occasional curses, and then turns and speed walks down the hall. 

It’s time to find Nova. 

* * *

In the end, as much as Tim can tell it pains Bruce to walk away, they both know it’s only going to keep Damian from talking if Bruce is within earshot. So when Tim reassures Bruce that he’s got it, he promises, for the fourth time, Bruce finally gives him a single nod and leaves, with one last reassurance thrown out to Damian as he turns to go. Just in case. 

And then it’s just Tim, his hand around Nova’s soft harness, and Damian. Little Damian, exhausted Damian, standing on the center of the rug and looking like he’s waiting for the shoe to drop and wants to go crawl into a hole for the next five years at least. 

“Damian,” Tim says quietly. “It’s just us. It’s okay.”

“Leave me alone.”

“No.”

“I said--”

“I know what you said. I’m not leaving yet. We’re going to talk.”

Damian scoffs. 

“We’re going to talk,” Tim says, firmly, forcing his own nervousness to not show in his tone. 

“What if I refuse.”

“We talk anyway.” And there’s his Robin voice from when he’s talking to criminals. Oops.

“Everyone in this house always wants to _ talk,”  _ Damian grumbles. He turns even further away from Tim, towards the window, and Tim would bet a hundred bucks Damian is at least mildly considering the pros and cons of shattering the glass and jumping out just to avoid Tim and the conversation he thinks they’re going to have. 

Tim sighs, and drags his free hand down his face hard. “Damian.” He takes a deep breath. “I am not Dick, okay? I’m not Bruce. I’m not Dinah or Alfred. I hate talks too, most of the time, but they work. They do, don’t tt at me, you acorn.”

“I do not want to talk, Drake.” 

“Oh, last names again, huh?” Tim whistles. “Ouch, Damian.” 

“Leave.”

“Nope. We’re going to talk, or at least I’m going to talk and you’re going to listen, and we’re going to clean that lamp up together afterwards.”

“That is a terrible plan.”

“And you get to hold Nova the entire time.”

_ There we go, _ Tim thinks with satisfaction. 

Damian has straightened up slightly. Dogs are one of his weakest spots, and Tim’s not afraid to fight dirty in times of need. Especially with Nova, or Peanut, who most of the time are the most tantalizing forbidden fruit since they’re primarily for only Tim or Jason, not the whole family. Desperate times, desperate measures, etc. etc. 

Tim forces himself to stay still and silent as Damian finally turns back to face him, staring Tim down with narrowed eyes. 

“The whole time?” Damian asks, suspicious.

“The whole time.” 

“No tricks? No conditions?”

Tim rolls his eyes. “Damian, she’s my dog and I want to talk to you. It’s as simple as that. Besides, if I end up really needing her for some reason, she’ll leave you anyway.”

Damian seems to consider this for several seconds, watching Nova now, with something on his face other than stubborn blankness at last. 

“Fine,” he mutters. “Fifteen minutes, maximum. And we sit apart.”

“Deal,” says Tim, instantly. “Do you want to stay here? Or find a closet?”

Damian gives me a funny look. “Why a closet?”

Tim shrugs, suddenly a little self-conscious. But this is about Damian, not him. “Dunno,” he says, trying to keep his voice light. “They make me feel more safe. I figured I’d ask just in case.”

Damian accepts this, and nods in acknowledgement but not agreement. “The corner,” he says, instead, gesturing over towards the side of the room that stands empty aside from a few bean bags. “Opposite sides. No touching.”

“No touching,” Tim agrees. 

And so they go. Nova doesn’t hesitate to sit right on Damian’s lap as soon as Tim gives her the okay, and Damian doesn’t hesitate to go to town rubbing and scratching every inch of her he can reach. 

_ We have got to get this kid his own dog,  _ Tim thinks, not for the first time, and then he clears his throat and braces for the conversation to come. He’s got this. He can do it. Damian is his brother, and Tim isn’t perfect but he’s going to try, and at the end of the day, that’s what’s going to matter most.

* * *

Five minutes in, it’s not going quite as well as Tim had been hoping. 

“I am not  _ sad!”  _ Damian snarls. 

Tim reminds himself to take deep breaths, and then carefully avoids Damian’s glare, looking down at his hoodie strings instead. Twist, untwist, twist. 

“Okay,” he says, diplomatically. “Um. Well. Do you know what you  _ are _ feeling?”

Damian’s scowl deepens, but it’s mixing with something more uncertain. On a different kid, Tim thinks Dick and Bruce might have labeled embarrassment, maybe. He doesn’t know. But this isn’t a different kid. This is Damian. And Tim doesn’t understand him, and Tim can’t read people like Dick does, not for emotions, but Tim does understand some things, and  _ this, _ he thinks, is one of them. 

“Okay,” he says again. “Okay, Damian. It doesn’t have to be sad. I’ve got—sometimes we feel other ways too, mixed with sad, or instead of it. When I watched a documentary about climate 

change Bruce had to listen to me yell for like, two whole hours before I just fell asleep on the couch.” 

“This is not climate change!” Damian snaps. “It is—he—that man—on purpose—“ his face is screwed up, and  _ Oh God, Oh No, _ Damian looks half like he’s gonna cry and half like he’s gonna tank out a knife and stab the wood paneling on the wall, and that’s just. 

No. Tim can do this. Tim’s an older brother and he knows how to help this and he’s going to fix it. Damian deserves to feel better than this. 

“You’re right!” he says quickly. “You’re right. This isn’t climate change. It’s always harder, worse, when you see people doing bad things on purpose, even when it’s obvious, even when you know they know. And it’s a living creature. I know.” 

Damian refocuses on Tim again, just a little. 

“I was only meaning that for me, usually when I’m upset by something like this it’s—I get—I just feel  _ bad,  _ Dames, it sucks, and I know how much you want to just—scream and fight the whole world at any cost. But Bruce and Dinah and everyone always make me sit and figure out what I’m feeling because that helps it be less terrible.”

“Talking about  _ feelings _ will not change what they have  _ done,” _ Damian snaps. “What people are  _ still _ doing—to the—it will not—“

“I know,” Tim agrees. “Damian, terrible things are done by people. You’ve seen it, I’ve seen it, we’re going to see it more in the future too, for the rest of our lives. And it sucks. And it’s wrong. But we can’t fix every single thing, there’s just way too much. And if we can’t fix something that’s making us upset, we have to figure out how to live with it.” 

It hits him for a second how many times he’s been given that particular line almost verbatim over the past couple of years. At least it’s being useful now.

Damian’s face reddens. Tim can see his eyes welling up just a little, and a slight shake in his brother’s upper body where he’s pressed up against Nova’s fur. . 

“I will not accept—“ 

“I didn’t say  _ accept,” _ Tim says, a little sharply, and then forces himself to close his eyes and take a really deep breath. “I said  _ live with. _ You don’t have to condone evil. But you have to figure out how to live with it in the world around us, all the time, or you’ll go insane and at the very least be miserable all the time.”

He opens his eyes, and he at least has Damian’s full attention again now. 

“How,” Damian says.

Tim hums.

“When I’m upset like this,” he says. “It took me a  _ loonnnng  _ time to figure out, but at the bottom of it I’m usually really sad, and feel helpless. And that combo makes me feel upset, or even angry.” 

“I am angry,” Damian says, voice tightening. “We should go to that place and find the man responsible for the death of those kittens in his prison, and—“

“Yeah, no,” Tim cuts him off. “No raining down revenge on people. I’m proud of you for being able to say that you’re angry. But that’s not the only thing. Anger is—it’s—“ He can’t find the words. Why is it always so hard to find words? Especially when he needs them most. Like right now. For Damian. Where it’s so, so important to say everything carefully, to say it right, why does he have to be losing them now? 

Tim huffs, and thunks the back of his head against the wall a few times. 

“Do not,” Damian says, immediately. He reaches out across Nova and tangles a hand in Tim’s sleeve. “Timothy. Stop. You are not supposed to hurt yourself.”

Tim sighs. “Sorry, Damian.” 

“Do not apologize to me. I am not the one who cares. I just don’t want Father to lecture me for not keeping your brain to its current level of brain damage.”

In Damian speak, that was about as close an admission Tim’s going to get that Damian cares. But he forces his rising smile down and tries to smooth out his thoughts, skimming tangled constellations and floating threads as he tries to find the right phrase he’s looking for. 

“Feeling mad is protective,” Tim says. “Anger’s there when we feel like something is unjust, right? Or when we’ve been wronged or hurt, or our beliefs have, or someone we care about has. Stuff like that. Right?”

Damian is clearly thinking.

“When we were all playing Rob Your Neighbor on Christmas,” Tim prods. “And Dick and Jason and I would roll doubles and steal one of the presents you’d grabbed from the pile, you didn’t get mad then. Why?”

Damian shoots him a look that says  _ Timothy, are you a fool? _

“Because,” Damian says, voice carefully controlled, “It was what we were  _ supposed to do.” _

Tim nods. “You expected it. It was fair, because it was part of the rules, and we all agreed on what the rules were. And you were on an even playing field where if you were the one to roll doubles, you could steal right back.” Tim holds a finger up.  _ “But,” _ he goes on, “when we were on patrol the other night, and we saw those drunk guys throwing rocks at that dog in the alley, you got really upset. What were you feeling then?”

“Angry!” Damian snarls, and his fists are already curling back up into white-knuckled balls. “No. Outraged. Furious! I—they were throwing rocks at her, and she did nothing to them—she had puppies, she couldn’t leave she was trying to protect—“ 

“Why is it wrong to throw rocks at a dog?” 

“You know!”

“Tell me. Explain it.” 

“I do not have to explain anything! Stop trying to—I do not want to talk about—it is  _ wrong, _ it is wrong, it just  _ is,  _ I cannot--stop trying to make me confused!”

Oh boy. Time to backpedal. This is why Tim lets Dick handle this stuff, he’s not good at it, he doesn’t know what he’s doing, he’s just going to make it worse.

“Whoa, Danes, hey, I’m sorry. I’m not trying to make you confused. I’m sorry. I know it’s wrong. I was just—ugh.” Tim growls, too, now, and takes a hand through his hair. 

“Are words. Hard right now,” he says, flatly, looking down at Damian. 

Damian looks mutinous for a moment. Tim can practically see the polar opposite conditionings at war in his enormous brain—the League’s lessons that he is never allowed to need help, to be less than perfect, to admit weakness, and the family’s constant reiterations that Damian doesn’t have to be normal to be  _ good, _ doesn’t need to always be able to speak or act perfectly right away, is allowed to need help or space or anything else. 

But Tim can’t fight the battles for Damian. So he sits and waits for each second of the silence that falls between them, and allows Damian to choose a path. 

“They are…” Damian starts, and swallows once, compulsively. 

“Tangled?” Tim offers. “Hard to reach?”

Damian nods.

“Can you listen all right?” Tim asks. “If I talk about it instead of making you talk? I’m sorry. I should have checked.”

“I can,” Damian acknowledges. 

Tim nods. “Okay. Okay. So. It’s wrong to throw rocks at a dog on purpose because it’s cruel, right? A dog is a living being that feels fear and pain and it hurts them. And they’re smaller and more fragile than us humans. It’s just cruel, it’s an abuse of power and it’s usually done to take out anger or rage, instead of handling those in a way that doesn’t hurt anyone.” 

“Yes,” Damian agrees. 

“Okay. So, again, you got angry when you saw the dog being hurt when she was innocent and trying to shield her babies.” 

“Yes.” 

“And,” Tim says, “you were angry because she was being hurt, and you were hurt for her.”

He can almost see the gears grinding in Damian’s brain.

“Anger is always caused by something,” Tim says. “Always, always, always. It can be really small or it can be something as big as, like...seeing your parents murdered, or something. But you’re never angry for no reason. And anger is there to try to make us act on that hurt, okay, to like...keep it from hurting us worse. Or someone or something we love worse. Do you understand?”

Damian nods slowly. 

“Anger is really strong,” Tim says, and then lets out a small, frustrated noise, and moves halfway through the motion to thunk his head back against the wall before he’s stopped by a glare from Damian. “Sorry. Um. Where was I? Oh, right, anger is really strong, and I am...not the person to teach you how to handle it, really. I’m still working on that. I mean, you saw me last month when I was breaking stuff in the cave.” Tim smiles wryly. “You’re not the only one in this family who has a membership in the throwing-things-around-and-shouting-at-Bruce club.”

Damian snorts.

“What can you tell me, then?” Damian asks, as he rubs his hands up and down Nova’s neck, and Nova has her head tilted up, eyes closed, in visible bliss. “Or was there no point to this conversation?”

“Hey, rude,” Tim says. He reaches across the small gap between them and flicks Damian’s ear gently. “There’s a point, okay, gimme a sec.”

“Your second is up. Too late.”

“You’ve been hanging out with Jason too much,” says Tim. “Jeez. Listen, okay, like I said, I’m not good at dealing with anger all the time, B and Dick are gonna be the ones to have to teach you about all that. I’m not half as in control as they are. But there is something that helps me when I’m angry, or sad, or feeling really helpless or hurt about bad things happening in the world, specifically. When it’s not about me, personally. Because that feels different, and it’s more direct, and just--yeah. Anyway. I know you’re not Jewish, but you know how B and I are?”

“Yes.” Damian frowns slightly, moving one hand up to slowly stroke between Nova’s ears. “Father said that according to the rules of his congregation, I am also Jewish by blood. Because I am his son. But that he will not force me to adhere to any of it if I do not wish.”

Tim nods. “Right. Reform Judaism accepts both matrilineal and patrilineal descent. And if you’re born a Jew, you’re a Jew, even if you don’t believe the religion. Even if you want to continue praciticing Islam, Bruce would be delighted, I think, if you wanted to learn some of his traditions, too. They’re one of the only things he has left from his mom.”

“You, too?” Damian asks. 

Tim swallows and looks away. “Yeah, me too. But it’s a little different. Anyway, that’s not the point. The point is that there’s this thing in Judaism that is like, really old, but has gotten more popular and kind of grown into its own movement and attitude, okay, and it’s called tikkun olam. Some people debate whether its a good or bad thing, just like they do with everything in Judaism, but like. It’s literally about repairing the world. It’s this idea that while you can’t fix the whole world, because it’s just way too big, you can fix part of it. And it’s your job while you’re alive in this world to find what that part is, and take it up, and repair it to be better than you find it. That everyone can take the piece of the world that’s theirs to change and make it better, all over the world, a little bit here, a little bit there, and at the end things will be just a little bit more whole.”

“Father is doing that with Gotham,” Damian says, sounding like he’s really considering now.

“Yeah,” Tim agrees. “Although honestly, Gotham is more like a godawful game of Whack-A-Mole than anything else. But yeah. Bruce is fixing what he can in Gotham, as Bruce Wayne and as Batman, and tries to get a bunch of other people to fix and heal their little areas of the city too. It’s made a difference. And the more things improve, the more other people will feel like they can make a difference too.”

Damian chews on his bottom lip, hands still in Nova’s fur. “This tikkun olam,” he says, slowly. “Does Father know it?”

Tim nods. “My mom taught me about it first, but Bruce is the one who really got me to understand it. And he was the one who reminded me about it when I was really hopeless about the world one time, and told me that when I felt like that I should think about what I can repair, somewhere, and then go and throw myself into that with all the fury I’m feeling until it’s gone and I can breathe again.”

“Do you think...he would teach me about this, too?” Damian asks. 

“I think he would love to, Dames.” Tim smiles and rubs a noogie on Damian’s head as his little brother scowls and jerks away. “Do you want to go find him and ask? He’ll even help you pick a social project or something today, I’d bet.”

Damian looks away, unable to meet Tim’s eyes, and one of his hands slides into his hoodie pocket, probably fiddling with some loose threads inside. Alfred is constantly having to re-sew Damian’s hoodies together from how much he tugs at their stitching. 

“I...if you...do you think it would actually help?” Damian asks. “I am so angry. So much of the time. I do not know how to...to let go of it, like the rest of you. It feels like it’s…” he shrugs a little helplessly. “Me.”

“Your anger is not you,” Tim says, fiercely, and he twists around on the floor until he’s facing Damian, knee to knee. Tim nudges Nova out of the way, ignoring Damian’s protest. “Damian. Listen. You don’t have to look at me, but you listen  _ good _ , understand?”

Damian makes a noise of assent, and stares at Tim’s ankle. 

“You are Damian Thomas al Ghul Wayne, and you are a good person. You love disgustingly healthy smoothies, and you’re a little pain in my butt, and you have a family who loves you so much you can’t even imagine yet, and you have a father who would shake heaven and earth and all the other earths in the multiverse for you if necessary, and you have been through a ridiculous amount of terrible things that you shouldn’t have had to go through and you have every right to be angry and sad and hurt and afraid and overwhelmed and brave and strong and hopeful and all the other words on those stupid feelings posters Bruce makes us use. You are not bad for feeling angry. You are a lot more than anger and a short temper and all the stuff like panic attacks and breaking objects and getting overwhelmed by noises and all that. You are so, so compassionate, Damian, you care about all the animals and people so much it amazes me. You’re so much like Bruce. And you will not be this angry forever, it’s going to get better. You’re going to get better and better and you are a good person, Damian, and you are not the things you struggle with. Do you understand.”

Damian doesn’t answer. Tim leans down and thunks his forehead against Damian slowly, so as not to startle him. 

“Damian,” he says. “Do you understand.”

Damian huffs out a small breath, and after another moment or two, pushes his forehead back against Tim’s in return. 

“Yes,” he says quietly. “I hear you. I am...going to try to believe you. Thank you, Timothy.”

“Good,” says Tim, and he straightens up. “That’s all you need to do for now. It gets better.”

Damian makes some unintelligible grumble and reaches for Nova, but Tim clicks his tongue and gets to her first. 

“Nuh uh,” Tim says, grinning. “Our talk is over. She’s mine now.”

“Timothy,” Damian nearly whines, and boy, is that a victory. “What if I’m not finished?”

“What,” Tim fake-gasps. “Does Damian Wayne actually want to talk?”

“No!” Damian snaps. “Yes. No. I mean--”

“Come on,” Tim says, holding out a hand. “I’ll help you find Bruce. We can tell him together that you want to learn about tikkun olam, okay? And maybe, if you let me try to get Dick on our side, too, we’ll be able to convince him that maybe one of the things you can repair in the world is the number of animals who are in shelters waiting for homes.”

Tim hears Damian’s breath hitch. And then Damian’s hand is shooting up to latch on to Tim’s in half a second, and he’s on his feet, practically dragging Tim for the door behind him.    
“Do you mean it,” he demands, while speed-walking. “Timothy. Do you mean that.”

“Of course, dummy,” Tim says. “We all know you should have a dog. It’s like, all you’ve wanted for months. We’ve got a betting pool about how who’s going to get Bruce to finally cave.”

“You are all imbeciles,” Damian says, but it doesn’t carry any heat. 

“Sure,” Tim says, easily. “But today you and I are gonna beat the dynamic duo and our dear sister and if you play up the emotions with Bruce while I make my logical case about you getting to help shelters by taking one of the puppies from that puppy mill we just busted up last week, I’ll split the winnings with you fifty-fifty.”

Damian glances back with a frown. “Who did you bet on?”

Tim grins. “You, obviously. It’s stupid to think that you’d let any of the rest of us win your battles for you.”

“Huh,” Damian says, turning back to face forward as they approach Bruce’s bedroom. “Huh.”

“Hey,” Tim says, tugging them both to a halt, briefly. “Damian.”

“What.”

“I’m proud of you,” Tim says. “I just...want you to know.”

Damian looks up at him, and there’s an odd expression on his face that Tim can’t quite read. 

“Thank you,” Damian says. “I am proud of you too. You are no Richard but...thank you.”

“Uh,” says Tim, and he fidgets with Nova’s harness. “Thanks, Dames. Are you ready to go convince Batman to get a puppy?”

Damian’s eyes light up and take on the glint that absolutely is all Bruce. “Let’s do this,” he says, with a slight grin. “Fifteen minutes of Batcomputer time says that we convince him in under twenty minutes.”

“Fifteen,” Tim counters.

“Deal.”

They shake on it, with the complicated handshake Jason wasted no time in teaching both of them and Cass each time one of them had joined the family, and then turn to face the door. 

“Right,” Tim says. “Repairing the world and getting a puppy, mission go.”

“Onward,” says Damian, and he pushes open the door.

Maybe, Tim thinks, as they walk in side by side, a united front that already has Bruce looking up from his book warily, he’s not quite so bad at the big brother thing as he’s afraid he is. And maybe, hopefully, Damian will really get something out of today that can help. 

He deserves it. Just as much as Tim did, Cass did, all of them did. Do. Still do. They’re all growing and healing at different rates. Even Bruce, according to him. So Tim’s going to believe Damian will, too. 

But right now, they’ve got a theoretical puppy to obtain. Damian has all the time in the world to figure out who he is outside of all the training and hurt. And they’ll all be walking with him every step of the way as he does. 

**Author's Note:**

> DRINK WATER, EAT FOOD, TAKE YOUR MEDS, AND KNOW THAT I LOVE AND AM PROUD OF YOU. Talk to someone if you need to. There are a lot of people who will listen. You deserve to take care of yourself. Be easy today.


End file.
